Sadr al-Din Muhammad Shirazi (1572-1640), more commonly called Mulla Sadra, was one of the grand scholars of later-period Islamic philosophy and has grown to become one of the best-known Muslim philosophers. Iksir al-'arifin , or Elixir of the Gnostics , is unique among Sadra's writings in that it reworks and amplifies an earlier Persian work, the Jawidan-nama ( Book of the Everlasting ) by Afdal al-Din Kashani, or Baba Afdal. The underlying theme of Sadra's amplification is emblematic of Muslim (...) philosophy: the importance of self-knowledge in an individual's journey of "Origin and Return," the soul's origins with God and its eventual return to Him. Everything, Sadra says, is on such a path, gradually disengaging from the material world and returning to a transcendent essence--all leading to a final fruition in which everything in the universe returns to God and finds permanent happiness. Philosophy, Sadra argues, is the most direct means to self-knowledge--and thus the best tool for navigating this journey. (shrink)

The aim of the present research is studying the relationship between the salespersons’ ethical philosophy and their ethical decision-making process and seeks to answer two fundamental questions: first, what is the ethical philosophy of salespersons? And second, how does the salespersons’ ethical philosophy affect their ethical decision-making process? Statistical population of this research is salespersons who have passed the sales training course at the Department of Commerce Research Centre. One hundred thirty-seven questionnaires of total 300 accessible populations were analyzed through (...) path analysis method. The findings indicate that most salespersons are idealists. Although this idealism affects the ethical judgment directly, but the effect of relativism on ethical intention is more considerable. (shrink)

Despite the majority opinion of Muslim jurists that organ donation is permitted in Sharia, surveys indicate continuing resistance by lay Muslims, especially to donating organs following death. Pakistan, a country with 165 million Muslims, currently reliant on live donors, is considering steps to establish deceased donor programs which will require public acceptance and support. This article analyzes the results of in-depth interviews with 105 members of the public focusing on opinions and knowledge about juristic rulings regarding kidney donations, donor-family dynamics (...) in deceased donation decisions, and attitudes towards buying kidneys. The objective was to determine the influence if any of cultural and religious values, and norms of traditional family structures and kinships, on decisions to donate. Study participants view donation of kidneys, particularly from the deceased, through a different lens from that used by jurists and physicians, one that also does not conform to familiar paradigms defining ethical organ donation. A socially modulated understanding of Islam passed down the generations, and longstanding family-centric norms, shape the moral worldview of many rather than academic juristic rulings or non-contextual concepts of autonomy and rights. The results of this study also highlight that medical science may be universal but its application occurs within particularities of cultural and religious values, social constructs of the self and its relationship with others, and different ways in which humans comprehend illness, suffering, and death. These findings are of relevance both to transplant related professionals and bioethicists involved with this field. (shrink)

The optimum science benefits to routine life have insufficiently been proved. Science progress is not merely reflected in machinery and technological breakthroughs. Subordinate impacts of science and scientists on global interactions are an evidence for the major deficiencies and futility of the many current science designations. A primary objective is to describe postmodern global interrelations of science mentoring policies and life quality. Also, global programs are proposed that will aid in the timely achievement of optimal real-life science goals. The global (...) wholeness of science pictures should be visible, acknowledged, and educated. The wholeness of science, no matter how exposed or sophisticated, should never change. Definitive paths should be developed to bestow science with sufficiently empowered authorities to lead and optimize economics, politics, and international relations. Mentoring rather than teaching of science will be a main frontier for quality lives. Postmodern mentors will be cognizant of the science entirety. Mentors will create and designate definitive shapes from discoveries and findings that will grant human life with ongoing peace and ultimate satisfaction. (shrink)

The objective is to introduce and describe a new philosophy for global science edification that will determine the extent and nature of humans’ accomplishments. These will affect life quality worldwide. Science as an ultimate essence encircles theoretical and applied findings and discoveries. These can only contribute to forming a trivial core, whilst the most crucial are insightful moral surroundings. Morality is most concerned with mentorship commitments. To sustain a dense and rigid shape that progressively improves science and life quality, imagination (...) must be complemented with harmonizing approaches. Such perceptions become an obligation as growing knowledge creates novel questions and challenges. The upper tree of science glorified with blooming branches of knowledge, particularly over the last few centuries, is predicted to undergo progressive declines in the strength of its edification foundations unless the lower tree receives most-deserving mentorship contemplations. The upper tree describes tangible science products in routin life, and the lower tree represents sustainable mentorship. Mentors must replace teachers, by definition, and commit to generating more qualified educators than themselves. Mentors are expected to welcome and manage challenges from mentees. Challenges play crucial roles in granting mentees with integrated pathways of scientific development. The resulting pictures will be eagerly prone to revisions and elaborations as mentees themselves step into the pathway. This systematic edification will strengthen science roots in mentees’ minds and will uphold a sturdy science body for society. Science pictured as an integrated circle grants a prospect to envision where humans are and where not to end up. Maintaining a definitive shape for science in any major before and while enriching central cores with experimental novelties in minds and laboratories is crucial to improving man’s fulfillment of time in the third millennium. Such integrities are an obligation to optimally preserve and utilize what humans have achieved thus far and continue to accomplish. (shrink)

We present a model of computation for string functions over single-sorted, total algebraic structures and study some basic features of a general theory of computability within this framework. Our concept generalizes the Blum-Shub-Smale setting of computability over the reals and other rings. By dealing with strings of arbitrary length instead of tuples of fixed length, some suppositions of deeper results within former approaches to generalized recursion theory become superfluous. Moreover, this gives the basis for introducing computational complexity in a BSS-like (...) manner. Relationships both to classical computability and to Friedman's concept of eds computability are established. Two kinds of nondeterminism as well as several variants of recognizability are investigated with respect to interdependencies on each other and on properties of the underlying structures. For structures of finite signatures, there are universal programs with the usual characteristics. For the general case of not necessarily finite signature, this subject will be studied in a separate, forthcoming paper. (shrink)

Mulla Sadra Shirazi is the first attempt in English to produce a thorough preparatory study of the intellectual biography of this famous Safavid thinker. Previous attempts by other thinkers have been marred by ideological prejudice and the lack of serious intellectual rigour. A proper understanding of Islamic intellectual history requires the study of canonical thinkers, of which Mulla Sadra is certainly one in the philosophical tradition of Iran. The book eschews legends and theoretical constructs of bibliography in favour of (...) a rigorous life that draws upon a wide range of primary sources, many of which are unpublished, and that demonstrate the significance and context of the intellectual contributions of Mulla Sadra. Mulla Sadra Shirazi is quite a traditional biography in that it seeks to locate the life of the thinker and his works in his historical and intellectual content. The course of ideas in Islam is an area of research that is of great interest at the moment; even the study of philosophy has flourished in recent years. Consistently, with recent works on other Islamic philosophers, this book sets the standard for approaching Islamic intellectual history by insisting upon an historical and source-critical approach, allied with a keen philological, but also philosophical, appreciation of the intellectual life of a thinker. The life is based upon the most recent scholarship on Safavid history and draws widely upon primary sources in Arabic and Persian, including a number of works in manuscript. For students of Islamic thought in the early modern period and those with a particular interest in philosophy in Safavid Iran, this book should be the first point of reference. Mulla Sadra Shirazi will become the foundation for further research both on Mulla Sadra and his thought, as well as the thought and intellectual trends of his period. (shrink)

As an exercise in comparative philosophical theology, our approach is more concerned with conceptual strategies than with historical although the animadversions of those versed in the history of each period will assist in reading the texts of each thinker. We need historians to make us aware of the questions to which thinkers of other ages and cultures were directing their energies, as well as the forms of thought available to them in making their response; but we philosophers hope to be (...) able to proceed without having to arm ourselves with extensive knowledge of the surrounding milieu, trusting that others more knowledgeable will correct and extend our efforts. Our contribution should then be one of offering perspectives within which further discourse may profitably proceed, suitably challenged and amended in the course of a common inquiry. Since my familiarity is with Aquinas, and since he comes chronologically first, I shall begin with him, though there is no discernible connection between the two thinkers other than their preoccupation with establishing the primacy of existing in a metaphysical discourse which had hitherto obscured its significance. (shrink)

Ptolemy presents only one argument for the eccentricity in his models of the superior planets, while each one of them has two eccentricities: one for center of the uniform motion, the other for the center of the constant distance. To take into account the first eccentricity, he introduces the equant point, but he provides no argument for the eccentricity of the center of the deferent. Why is the second eccentricity different from the first one? The 13 th century astronomer Quṭb (...) al-Dīn al-Shīrāzī, a member of the famous school of Marāgha, who was interested in this problem, suggests the “retrograde arcs” as the empirical origin of the second eccentricity and develops an argument to justify this conjecture. Although his argument is not without difficulty, his suggestion is in line with the suggestions made by some historians of astronomy in recent decades. Résumé Ptolémée ne donne qu'un seul argument pour expliquer dans son système l'excentricité des planètes supérieures, alors que chacune d'elles a deux excentricités: l'une par rapport au centre du mouvement uniforme, l'autre par rapport au centre de la distance constante. Pour rendre compte de la première excentricité, il introduit le point équant, mais il ne donne en revanche aucun argument pour l'excentricité par rapport au centre du cercle déférent. Or, pourquoi la seconde excentricité est-elle différente de la première? Quṭb al-Dīn al-Shīrāzī, astronome du xiii e siècle membre de l'école de Marāgha, qui s'est intéressé à cette question, a fait l'hypothèse que les “arcs de rétrogradation” constituent l'origine empirique de cette seconde excentricité. Bien que l'argument sur lequel il appuie cette hypothèse ne soit pas exempt de difficultés, sa suggestion rejoint celles faites par des historiens de l'astronomie durant les dernières décennies. (shrink)